Run
Chapter Eighteen
As I hurry to leave, I snatch up the attacker’s small red-and-black-checked backpack. I have no time to search the man’s body, but perhaps the bag contains items that might identify the attacker.
Outside Leblanc’s room, a bright scarlet light above the door flashes and emits a shrill alarm.
Nobody is in the corridor. I can’t go back past the nurse’s station.
And the other end of the ward is staffed at night.
Security officers could approach from either direction at any moment.
All fire exits have alarms fitted, and cameras are installed in the stairwells.
I need a strategy.
Fast.
Using the back of the utility knife, I break the glass of the fire alarm mounted on the wall.
Instantly, deafening bells begin ringing, drowning out the security alarm.
Even though I will be caught on camera, I push through the fire exit door and slam the door closed behind me.
I descend the emergency stairs to the first stairwell, which I know is a blind spot.
Working furiously but efficiently, I remove the porter garb, clean the knife wound as best I can, and use the utility knife to cut a strip off the polo shirt before tying the makeshift bandage tightly around my arm.
Once I’ve changed into scrubs, I stuff everything into my larger rucksack.
Sounds of movement come from above. Grateful to have listened to Mrs Bellacci, I fix the dark wig onto my blond crop before pulling up my medical mask and putting on glasses.
Losing no time, I set both rucksacks over my shoulders and descend.
A few flights down, I merge with a cluster of staff who burst through another exit door on their way to evacuate the building.
“A bloody false alarm. I’ll bet you money,” says a male nurse leading the charge. “Probably set off by some insomniac. And now the whole bloody ward will wake up, and I’ll have to rush around trying to reassure them and get them back to sleep.”
“Always better to be safe than sorry,” comes the female voice of someone behind him. “Where’s the meeting point again?”
“Medical staff car park. I hope the fire wardens get a move on. It’s bloody cold out there tonight.”
On my first day, one of the team took me through the procedures for a fire drill and showed me the spot in the hospital car park where everyone should congregate. Security staff will know exactly where the alarm was activated. That’s the first place they always check in case there’s a false alarm.
By then, I will be gone.
Adrenaline pumps through my body as I push through the door on the ground floor into the cold night air.
Everyone muddles together in confusion in the car park, looking to the upper storeys for signs of flames, and nobody notices when I slip out of the side gate onto the main road.
In the distance, I hear the wail of approaching sirens.
Leblanc telling me to run makes sense. Aksel has been captured on CCTV neutralising an armed and highly trained assassin.
When police review the footage of what happened in that room, they will see that I am not the instigator.
The problem is, what other government departments will gain a copy?
When I return to the flat, I must pack and move on. But where?
I had hoped that Leblanc would be conscious and I could ask her questions, even if I only received a nod or a single-word response.
Is the Hartfield Institute in the UK? And is Dr Maurice Leblanc the same person mentioned on the card as the one written about in her letter?
More importantly, is he a relative and somehow involved in what happened to me?
I follow my usual route back, down a narrow alleyway, then past a small parade of unlit shops in a quiet residential side street away from the main high road.
The streetlights are intermittent here, and I can move freely in the shadows.
My arm is throbbing. I will need to dig out the first-aid kit when I get home to give the wound a thorough inspection and apply a proper dressing.
When I pull out my phone and am about to switch it on to check for messages, something catches my eye.
Ahead of me, a car has turned into the empty street.
The driver puts the lights momentarily on full before killing them entirely and bringing the vehicle to a halt.
Two silhouettes emerge from the back. The light of a mobile phone illuminates the driver’s face, something he switches off when he spies me.
I should have taken a different route home.
But how could they know to follow me when I’m wearing a disguise?
No point rationalising. My arm is still weak from the stab wound.
Can I tackle both men with one limb weakened?
Deciding a strategic retreat might be the best solution, I begin to back away and turn.
Two other figures approach from the way I have come, one with a phone clamped to his ear.
Four assailants.
Even in good health and without injury, taking on three combatants might be a challenge.
My mind stills anyway as I pull out the utility knife and prepare to fight.
I decide to tackle the two men who have followed on foot first. One is ahead of the other.
The one on his phone lags behind as he puts the device away and searches for something in his jacket pocket. The one in front has a knife drawn.
When he lunges, I use the hospital assailant’s rucksack as a shield, before crouching low with a swinging kick that knocks the man’s feet from under him.
Even as he hits the ground hard, I notice the other man has drawn a revolver.
He hesitates before firing off a shot, perhaps because he might hit his sidekick.
I roll to one side into a shop doorway and hope the shade works in my favour.
I barely notice the roar of a motorcycle from an intersecting lane until the rider screeches around the corner, swerves the machine onto the pavement and swings a crash helmet into the side of the attacker’s head.
The man is thrown off balance, losing his footing, and drops to the pavement.
When the biker brings the machine to a halt and lifts the visor, I am momentarily confused, my brain readjusting to a different kind of attack—until the eyes of Lorenzo stare back at me.
“Get on,” he says, tossing me the spare helmet before pulling a gun with a suppressor from inside the front of his leather jacket.
I catch the headgear and run towards the bike, putting the knife away.
A muted shot ricochets off a lamppost. One of the men from the car sprints towards us, holding a pistol at chest height.
Lorenzo fires three shots past me and a round at the men on the ground.
I climb on the back of the bike and clip the helmet in place.
When I look up, three bodies lie on the pavement while the driver rushes back to the car.
I grasp Lorenzo around the stomach and slap his shoulder.
As we speed past the parked car, he fires a shot into the front tyre before roaring towards the main road.
The engine is too loud for us to converse meaningfully, but I know I must try when we cross Vauxhall Bridge heading south and in the wrong direction.
“My flat is north,” I shout.
“We will not go there. We need somewhere safe. You have anything important there?”
“Just clothes.”
“Perhaps we collect tomorrow. Perhaps not. But there is one thing you need to know.”
“Yes.”
“If you ever get yourself killed, I will kill you. Understood?” he shouts, his angry words making no sense yet making complete sense.
For now, I store away questions I want to ask him, press my body into his back, and squeeze my thighs against his.
Tonight has been eventful, and I must take this time to centre myself.
Do I trust Lorenzo? Absolutely. With my whole being.
“Understood,” I murmur into his back.
As we race through the main streets, my mind clears and floats to the fact that these men had singled me out. With sudden clarity, a realisation hits me.
“Stop. Pull over,” I shout.
“What?”
“Pull over!”
Lorenzo pulls the bike into a side street and stops beneath a streetlamp.
Instantly, I jump off the bike and remove the red and black rucksack from my shoulder.
I pull out an odd assortment of items, including innocent ones like sweet wrappers and a puzzle book.
There’s also a roll of British banknotes, a laminated floor plan of the hospital and a box of ammunition.
I find what I had suspected in a small side pocket. A mobile phone switched to silent.
I scan the pavement and notice a row of tall dustbins awaiting collection. After transferring everything else into my bag, I step away and toss the phone and rucksack into a random blue-topped recycle bin.
“How far are we from your place?” I ask.
“Fifteen or twenty minutes.”
“Let’s go.”
We head into the back streets of Vauxhall until he slows the bike and drives through a dimly lit archway into a courtyard surrounded by council flats.
Without a word, he parks and secures the motorcycle before removing his helmet and holding a hand out for mine.
With everything stored away, he leads me to an entry door, prods in a code, and we climb four flights of stone stairs.
The flat’s interior is deceptively modern and spacious, a significant step up from where I have been staying. Lorenzo holds the door open to allow me to cross the threshold before locking the door, then slams me up against the wall.
“You left me,” he says before crushing our mouths together. I return the embrace, but he must have noticed me wince with pain at the pressure of his forearm on my upper arm. When he pulls away, his eyes widen as he looks at my arm.
“What is this?”